Windows 7 to Windows 8:No DVD Playback and More

Windows 8 finally came to face the world on October 26th, with its several forms: Windows 8, Windows 8 Pro, Windows 8 RT, and Windows 8 Enterprise.

Are you going to update your Windows system from Win 7 to Win 8? If you are not decided yet, let’s check out how Windows 8 has changed compared with its previous version.

1. The “Start” button is removed. As an initial option for all its previous versions, this menu has been there since Windows 95. So is the “Start” menu. This is designed to fully support the “start screen” full-screen menu, which changes from still to dynamic icon.

2. Windows Aero is killed. The Aero Glass - the graphical centerpiece of Windows Vista and Windows 7 disappears in Win 8 as to support Metro start screen.

3. Flip 3D is replaced by Modern UI app. All those animations and transparent glass effects are gone as well as the disappearance of Flip 3D. For Windows 7 or Vista, (key) Windows + Tab allow you to view Flip 3D.

4. Windows update desktop notifications won’t appear on the desktop. All notifications about Windows updates will be shown on the login and lock screens.

5. Some desktop apps will not be available on the desktop. Or will only be seen on the Windows 8 “start screen”.

6. Windows backup and restore is also no longer possible in Windows 8.
 

7. Windows Media Center and DVD playback
As Windows Media Center won’t be pre-installed as a default program, Windows Media Player is not available as well. If you do not install Windows Media Center and purchase Media Center upgrade, no DVD playback is allowed. Even if you download the feature packs will you only be able to play DVD in Media Center, not in WMP. To play DVD in Windows Media Player, an add-on for DVD support from Windows Store is necessary. But for free option, you can try VLC Media Player, or some other video players for DVD playback. Besides, Windows DVD Maker remains no more.

The reason for this is mainly because of the rise on streaming online videos and the decline in DVD and other traditional/physical discs.

Well, there is some kind of tricks we can solve some of the dislikes in Windows 8. After all, it provides many more promising new features. It's technology, people move on! What do you say?

Related Articles:

DVD Playback is not Supported in Windows 8 Without Built-in WMC
Best Free Options for DVD Playback in Windows 8
Best Free Video Player Software for DVD Playback 

Best Free Video Player Software for DVD Playback

Although DVD has lost its past popularity as Blu-ray and online streaming boomed and have rapidly developed these years, many movies lovers, DVD collectors would still like to extend their DVD movies collection. For the sake of these guys, the free DVD players for DVD playback (for Windows) listed below would be useful, I hope.

1. Windows Media Player
If you are not using Windows 8, you may easily get DVD played on your computer. This default Windows Media Player developed by Software enables DVD playback. In Windows Media Player, you can play audio CDs, data CDs, and data DVDs that contain music or video files. If you have a DVD drive and a compatible DVD decoder installed on your computer, you can use Windows Media Player to play a DVD-Video disc.

2. Free Version BS Player
BS Player supports more than 90 languages and plays high definition videos in formats of DivX, HD and AVC video, movie, audio, DVD, etc. You can enjoy the playback of HD DVD and AVCHD movies of the highest quality with minimal system requirements by using BS Player.

BS Player works nice for DVD files on Android Smartphones and tablet PCs as well.

3. VLC Media Player
Needless to mention about its high reputation or powerful functions, this wonderful free video player VLC Media Player enables DVD playback. Generally speaking, almost any videos can be viewed through it. Besides, Windows 8 DVD playback is also available with it.

4. UM Player
UM Player is also free and open source video player software. It plays everything as displayed in its website. This media player features as advanced yet simple to use, cross-platform supportive, etc. Media formats such as AAC, AC3, ASF, AVI, DIVX, FLV, H.263, Matroska, MOV, MP3, MP4, MPEG, OGG, QT, RealMedia, VOB, Vorbis, WAV, WMA, WMV, XVID and many more, are all can be played with UM Player.

5. Real Player
Real Player, the product by a giant media enterprise Real Networks, plays more audio and video files than most media players. It allows video downloading from websites with a single click and then you can transfer them to mobile or other portable devices. Converting and editing also can be fulfilled with Real Player.

There should be more amazing video player software out there, if you guys have some recommendations, please feel free to leave a message for me to  enlarge my collections.

Best Free Options for DVD Playback in Windows 8: VLC Media Player

As is already not news, DVD playback is not supported in Windows 8 by default since it contains no pre-installed Windows Media Center in it. Some users find it annoying since sometimes there is need of DVD viewing. The officially recommended solution to this calls for updates of Windows 8 Pro pack, to get the Windows Media Center, which enables DVD playback. (As shown below)

I would rather not pay to get the Windows 8 pro pack just for DVD playback through Media Center while Windows Media Player is still not compatible with DVD. Here collects some awesome video players that can solve this problem completely and freely.

1. VLC Media Player (highly recommended)

This “play-anything” video player invented by VideoLAN (non-profit organization) costs users nothing to play videos of almost any formats, DVD files included. Additionally, this free open-source video player software runs on all platforms, with Windows 8 on its list.

2. Free version of RealPlayer



As probably the world’s most widely used media player, RealPlayer allows media playback for almost any formats. It plays more file formats than Windows Media Player as announced on its official website homepage.(FYI)


3. KMPlayer

Maybe this one is not as well-known as the above two, yet it definitely is a brilliant free media player which supports various formats (including DVD), languages, skins, etc. This powerful media player, with its own internal Codec, internal or external, enables you to modify your environment to a convenient multi-media format by using KMP.(FYI)

There are many other free options to play DVD in Windows 8 PC, such as SMPlayer (with MPlayer as its playback engine and its own codecs without codec packs installment which save you much trouble), etc.

In spite of the media player as options for DVD playback in Windows 8, you can probably try other methods as well. DVD rippers to get the DVD videos in other formats for playback would be another way, I suppose. After all, it seems that Microsoft tried to strip the DVD playback function for consumers’ sake of reducing fees as has done of the opposite, I’m afraid.

DVD Playback is not Supported in Windows 8 Without Built-in WMC

Without the built-in Windows Media Center, playback of DVDs encoded using the most widely-used MPEG-2 video format and Dolby audio format would not be supported in Windows 8. Nor can users burn DVDs directly, unless you pay for Windows Media Center, which is only available on the updated Windows 8 Pro version. Or maybe you can get it solved by some 3rd party software.

And from Windows 8 to the Pro version, Windows 8 Pro Pack is indispensable. In the Building Windows 8 blog, Steven Sinofsky wrote" Based on the above discussion, it should be clear that we cannot enable DVD playback all the time in Windows Media Player. Given the ongoing feedback to avoid feature overlap and to avoid the complexity of behavior changing for a previously installed component, we only enable DVD playback in Media Center once it is installed. "

One of the reasons for such remove of DVD playback function from its previous versions with pre-installed Windows Media Center is mainly because of the vastly decreasing usage in PC TV and DVD playback these years. Slim and portable tablets (with no DVD drive) even could be viewed as the substitution of PC, and streaming media online (Netflix, YouTube, etc.), the changing consuming direction and pattern, leads to the declining of DVDs.

For another reason, as pre-installed software for DVD playback costs, while many PCs would not ever contain an optical DVD drive as is commonly-seen in recent PCs. However, such PC Windows still carries the cost. This is somehow for consumer’s sake.

The future video supporting mainly goes to streaming online (Netflix, YouTube, etc.) playback.

However, Cyberlink would provide consumers with software for DVDs which may probably pre-installed on Windows 8. In fact, there are many other choices of DVD tool. Does this bother you if upgrading to the Windows 8?

Related Articles:

Windows 7 to Windows 8:No DVD Playback and More 
Best Free Options for DVD Playback in Windows 8: VLC Media Player